Use Langston Hughes's poem, "Words Like Freedom," to explore the concepts of freedom and liberty. Learners read the poem, determine the theme, and use the provided graphic organizer to examine the connotative and denotative meanings of...

The opening chapters of Mark Twain's masterpiece, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, can be daunting for some readers. A reader's theater assignment divides the second chapter of the novel into a seven-role script, allowing...

Encourage your learners to examine the setting in Theodore Taylor's The Cay. Pupils work in small groups to put together a description of the setting before reading two more chapters of the book. They use their double-entry journals to...

Building upon prior lessons in the series, this reading and writing exercise requires pupils to look back at their own writing, track character development in the novel The Cay, and analyze how Phillip has changed. The reading focus is...

A set of 14 lessons on multiplication would make a great learning experience for your fourth grade learners. After completing a pre-assessment, kids work through lessons that focus on multiples of 10, double-digit multiplication, and...

Sugar isn't good for you, but it's great for microbes. A simple experiment has pupils investigate the digestion of starch by microbes to produce sugars. They apply two bacterial cultures, an amylase solution, and distilled water on a...

Conduct a close reading of chapter 9 of The Cay. Read the chapter again and ask pupils to respond to a list of included text-dependent questions. Finish the class with the provided writing assignment, which asks learners to use textual...

Take a break from literature study to address some grammatical concerns. Using a text you've already read in your class, show how to analyze pronoun use. After watching the master, pairs analyze a short excerpt on their own, identifying...

Students compose equations and inequalities whose solutions are the integers 1-31 and utilize them to number one month of a calendar. They take notes on two ways to work backwards from a solution: by using the number and by setting x...

Imagine a list that includes Alan Abelson of Baron's, Bob Woodward of the Washington Post, and Mother Jones. High schoolers select a national columnist, read and annotate five columns by this author, noting the rhetorical...

Writing teaches us so much. One can identify the many characteristics of a newspaper, use the Internet to gather information, and communicate with others. Primary students create a class newspaper for publishing and dispersal.

Birds help other birds find food? Scholars are placed into one of five groups of different birds. Each group then "feeds" on letters of paper in a field and gather five pieces per person. As each group plays, more food is exposed,...

As part of their study of future tense verbs, language learners engage in activities, read fables, and sing songs. The 25-page packet includes detailed lessons, worksheets, graphic organizers, and answer keys for assessments.

Intended as a follow up to the Protecting Your Drinking Water activity, young environmentalists use their assessment of the a hypothetical town's water supply to debate the installation of underground chemical storage tanks. With...

How long do we have to wait? Given several days of times between eruptions of Old Faithful, learners create a graphical representation for two days. Groups combine their data to determine an appropriate wait time between eruptions.

Get your pupils outside and teach them about peace at the same time! Scholars create a list describing peace, hike outside, add to that list, and later create poems. The exercises support differentiation for your individual classes as...

Learners explore key concepts/facts in 20th Century history, develop interview questions, and produce master list of questions that can be used in project. Students then interview grandparent, great-grandparent, or other elder about...

The WritingDEN includes feature articles with associated words, sentences, and paragraphs to aid in the writing process. Interactive features include pronunciation guides and content quizzes. The Tips-o-matic section offers grammar...

The best way to write is to write! Here are a variety of writing prompts for grades 1-12. A valuable resource.